For In Every Dawn Sleeps Darkness
by SunandShadows
Summary: Modern retelling, influenced by any and all earlier versions. I make no promises to keep to canon. Enjoy, and please review if you wish. I adore feedback! :
1. Chapter 1

**For In Every Dawn Sleeps Darkness**

By Angelle Chandler

**Chapter 1**

"Out of the way! Clear the way! Damn it, _move!_" Pushing back the rag-tag crowd half blocking the Emergency Room doors, the white-clad EMT yanked hard on the gurney, dragging it with a clattering screech across the linoleum entryway, nearly pulling it out of his partner's hands. The swaddled form on the cart, covered to the neck in a starched white sheet so that little showed but a spill of dark gold curls, did not move. Reluctantly, the motley mix of reporters and bystanders fell back as the pneumatic doors began to wheeze closed. "Is she all right?" a tall woman clutching the collar of her coat closed against the chill night wind shouted after them. "When will she be able to talk to us?" Ignoring her, the EMTs swung the cart around a corner and banged through the double doors into the triage area.

Expecting them, two nurses rushed forward to join them at the gurney. "Is this the one from the university fire?" Pulling the stethoscope forward and onto her ears, she placed it on the unmoving figure on the cart, listening. The lead EMT nodded to her raised eyes. "Hmm." Briskly dropping the stethoscope, she stepped up, stripping the sheet from the still form. The garish costume covered with spangles was shocking against the stark white of the hospital walls. Bright makeup, heavily yet expertly applied, stood out sharply against the pale, delicate features. "How many is that now?" Her eyes flicked to the younger nurse. A quick flip through the chart in her hands and a mental calculation, then the girl replied, "Fourteen. Minor injuries mostly, bruises and crowd injuries. Mild smoke inhalation. Shock." She glanced down. "This is the last one, the one everyone thought was missing." The gray-haired nurse caught the lead EMTs eye as she picked up one slim arm and registered the pulse. "Where did you find her?"

"On the roof." The two men shifted uneasily, neither one wanting to hold her gaze. The truth was, it was a miracle they'd found the girl at all. The fire department, local police and university security had been herding the masses of walking-wounded from the burning auditorium. The opening-night crowd (well-dressed, intelligent, a mix of students, faculty and local culture mavens) had run, walked and stumbled from the inferno of the Glassman Performing Arts Center unable to say exactly what had started the fire. Gounod's Faust had nearly reached its climax when the acid reek of smoke began to creep into the house. Before the audience could begin to react, some sort of explosion shook the old brick and wood building, rattling the brass railings and doors. Then the screaming had begun.

All things considered, the evacuation had gone spectacularly well. The Head of the Astronomy Department, a Professor McNaughton, had broken an ankle on the front steps, and several others were bruised and battered, but most of the sold-out six-hundred-seat theatre had made it out in one piece. As Chief Dumbarton oversaw the loading of Professor McNaughton into a waiting ambulance, and police inspectors were threading through the remaining crowd taking statements, a tall, thin man in a white tuxedo streaked with smoke hurried up to EMT Frank Black. Wringing his hands, the distraught man craned his neck around to look over his shoulder at the historic building now going up in flames, then turned back to Black. Fear glittered his eyes. "Do you need assistance, sir?" Black's eyes followed his gaze back to the burning theatre. The man looked familiar. Black frowned. Suddenly it clicked: the face looked back at him from the poster on the huge display in the front of the Glassman; Professor Raymond Schultz, the director.

Schultz hesitated, licking thin lips. "I think," he paused, glancing back again, flames reflecting in the dark of his eyes. "I _believe_… that one of the cast may be missing." Black raised a hand, signaling Chief Dumbarton. The Chief cut an imposing figure, parting the growing crowd of onlookers easily before a group of officers began shooing them back, pushing the orange and white public safety barricades into place. "What've you got?" Black nodded towards the trembling director. "Missing person. He says she may still be inside." Dumbarton's eyes widened. "Inside? Anyone still inside there isn't coming out." Schultz turned paler, something hardly possible. "Who is it? Are you sure they're not out here? On the way to the hospital?" Professor Schultz shook his head. "No, she's… she hasn't come out." Black and Dumbarton watched him steadily – how could he be so certain? The professor licked his lips. "You see, there were – threats. Threats against… against her, against one of the other players. And," he licked his dry lips again. "I'm sure she hasn't come out. She may have disappeared before the fire began."

Dumbarton shared a glance with Black, nonplussed. What was this – an accident, a missing person, or some other crime? Was the girl even still here? "What girl? Who are we looking for, mister?" He could distribute the description, put out a missing persons, but there was no way he was authorizing _any_ of his men to go back into the burning auditorium – the whole thing was about to come down. "Christine Daae'," the director murmured. He reached down and plucked a crumpled program from the asphalt parking lot, smoothing it open and turning back to the last few pages. "Junior, transfer from out of state last year. She was – is – in the chorus. And… understudy for Marguerite." Schultz pointed a slender finger at a black and white photo of a group of choristers smiling up at the camera. The object of his gesture was a fair-haired young woman with a bright smile and a mischievous twinkle in her eyes, a little apart from those around her in the front row. She looked like any other university girl; pretty, healthy, full of life. Dumbarton studied her face for a moment, preparing to search the crowd, hoping against hope that Schultz had just missed her in the confusion and dark.

A slight figure incongruously dressed in angel's wings and a fluttering white robe appeared beside the director out of the orange-lit night, clutching at his arm. "Have you found Christine?" she begged, wide eyes brimming. "She's not here. _She's not here!_" The little angel (one of the chorus, Dumbarton realized) didn't wait, but turned to run back towards the burning auditorium. "Stop her!" Dumbarton called, but needn't have worried. Frozen in place, she stared up, up to the roof of the century-old building. A scream ripped from her throat, seeming much too big for the diminutive angel. "Look! _Christine!_" All eyes turned first to the little chorister, then followed her horrified gaze to the top of the Glassman, and the figure who stood near the edge.

Even through the thick haze of smoke, Dumbarton recognized the pale young woman. She seemed dazed, taking a stumbling step closer to the edge of the scalloped roof. The crowd gasped, then let out a sigh of relief as she spun and stepped backwards. Dumbarton's eyes ran from the girl to the two stories below her – the fire had consumed much of the supporting structure, and the building groaned and shifted ominously. Several figures clad in disaster rescue gear and ventilators rushed forward, scrambling to put a rescue net into place. "Stay back!" Dumbarton yelled. "You can't get close enough. It's going to come down!"

Everyone's eyes were glued to the figure on the roof. Her hair swept her pale face, whipped by the hot wind rising from the flames. Her eyes shone blankly, wide with shock and terror. Holding her arms out in supplication, she backed slowly away from the edge as the building began to crumble.

Black shut his eyes tight with a shudder. When he opened them, both nurses were staring raptly at him, waiting for him to continue. "The building came down, just – crumbled around her. I don't know how she survived, but somehow they got under her with the net just as she hit the ground. Didn't even get a scratch." He looked at his partner, unwilling to voice the thought they both shared. His partner had no such compunctions. "It was a miracle." The ER nurse cleared her throat after a pause. "Well," she said crisply, "miracle or not, this young lady has had quite a night. She's in shock, she's breathed a lot of smoke, and she'll have to have a battery of x-rays and CT scans before she can go home." She reached out, tucking one dark gold curl behind the unconscious young woman's ear. "I imagine she'll have a story to tell once she wakes up."

Darkness. Screaming. Swirling music and the harsh smell of smoke. She ran, heart hammering until it choked her, fleeing higher and higher through the shadowed recesses of the disused backstage areas. She had to keep running, to hide, or else he would find her again – _he_ with the eyes like burning ice and the voice of an angel. She stumbled, tripping over a thick nest of ropes, then caught herself, rising higher and higher through the attic of the theatre, passing row upon row of gaily painted backdrops and dusty props and scenes. Faster she ran, fleeing the screams and smoke rising behind her, stopping only to twist aside the thick metal bolt and shove open the trap door to the rooftop with a shrill shriek almost lost in the chaos of cries and sirens below. The cold night air flooded over her, cooling her flushed face. _Free._

His image rose before her, blocking out the sky. The voices below cried out in sympathy with her as her hands rose in a futile attempt to shield herself. _No! Please, no! I don't belong to you!_ The world spun around her, falling away at last in a haze of swirling grey.

She opened her eyes.

-  
AMC 2 May, 2006


	2. Chapter 2

**For In Every Dawn Sleeps Darkness**

By Angelle Chandler

**Chapter 2**

"Good morning, sleepyhead! Nothing starts my day off right like your smiling face!" Reg set the tray down on the bedside table with a clatter of cold metal. Not like it mattered – the chick in the bed sure wasn't going to be disturbed by the sound. And even if she was – who would she tell? She wasn't making any complaints. In fact, she hadn't been doing much of _anything_ since they started electroshock treatments a month ago. Just sat and stared most of the time. _But at least she's not screaming anymore. _

He rolled back the sleeves of his white uniform, stepping back out onto the ward to check for a nurse. Not that he _needed _a nurse to feed Sleeping Beauty, not at 220 pounds of (almost) solid muscle, but it made things easier if one person held the nasogastric tube steady while the other poured the liquid meal down her throat. _Besides, it creeps me out the way she look through you like you ain't there. Or _she_ aint. _

Reg eyed the bland beige nutrient filling the metal pitcher, beaded with condensation, with distaste. _Shit, I wouldn't eat that shit, either. _He spotted Filipa out on the ward and raised a hand. She nodded, moving gracefully through the robed patients dotting the morning room to the wing with the private rooms – politely called 'suites'to the Board of Directors – and smiled in greeting. "How's it hanging, Filipa-baby?" Reg winked. "Another beautiful day on the nut farm."

Filipa frowned up at him, her dark eyes sharp. "It _was_," she acknowledged, then brushed past him to the bed. "And then _you_ came on duty." The tiniest trace of an accent softened the sting of her words as she reached for one of the pale hands lying on the thin nubbly coverlet. "Good morning, Christine," she said warmly, with forced good cheer. "It's time to wake up now. Can you open your eyes?" She continued massaging the pale fingers with both of her hands, then patted them briskly.

Reg watched with disinterest as the tiny nurse went through her morning routine and gazed around the mostly empty room. Stark and sterile, there were a few cards taped with yellowing Scotch tape to the wall, one vase of wilting daisies, and that was all. The girl in the bed received few visitors. "I don't know why you bother," he muttered, sticking one finger into the pitcher on the table. "She don't hear you. Or if she do, she don't care." He stuck the finger into his mouth, then grimaced. _God-damn. Why they feed that shit to sick people? No wonder they sick._ He looked at Filipa. "Girl's batshit crazy anyhow."

Filipa stopped patting, her back stiffening. Her voice was still soft, but had lost the forced cheeriness. "She's a young lady who's had a very rough time. She is _not_ 'batshit crazy' _orderly_," her eyes flicked to Reg, "and she is _not deaf_, either, you insensitive prick, so I'll thank you to watch your ignorant mouth." She dropped the girl's hand back onto the coverlet and quickly crossed herself with a whisper, "Madre Mia, please forgive me, but he _really_ pisses me off." All professionalism once again, she efficiently unbuckled the rugged leather restraint fastening the girl's wrist to the bedrail and, with a quick bend, unlatched the side-rail and dropped it down. As it clunked into place, Reg's eyes went to the slight figure in the bed. To his embarrassment, her green eyes were open, staring at him with a perplexed expression. Heat rose to his cheeks.

"Aw, shit, Filipa. I'm sorry. I didn't know she was awake." _At least he has the decency to look ashamed._ Filipa reached for the remote dangling down from the side of the bed and began raising the head. Reg shifted. "Chart said she had shock yesterday; Man, I thought she'd sleep all day like she always does." Filipa reached out, tenderly brushing a lock of dark cornsilk hair back from the wan face. "She did have _treatment_ yesterday," she said pointedly. "She's coming back easier every time now. Aren't you, belleza?" She adjusted the girl's shoulders to keep her sitting comfortably as the bed settled into position, then squeezed the pale hand. "She's coming back."

_Back to what?_, Reg wondered. _Why on earth she want to come back to this, I do not know._ He picked up the nasogastric tube, folding it and unfolding it again.

The girl on the bed turned her head slightly, her confused eyes seeking Filipa's face. The nurse smiled encouragingly, sinking down on the edge of the mattress. This wasn't protocol, of course, but she genuinely cared for her young patient, lost and wandering – childlike – in the deluded dungeons of her own mind. She touched the pale cheek gently. "Good morning, Christine," she repeated. "Would you like to have some breakfast today, belleza?" Though she was thin and pale, her struggles had somehow refined the girl's features, so the endearment was apt. "Get her some real food, Reg. Throw that muck in the toilet where it belongs." Filipa leaned across the girl to unbuckle the second strap, freeing her other arm.

"Lady, you gone crazy? What the hell you _doing_?" Reg jumped back, colliding with the L-shaped table, rattling the pitcher and slopping a rivulet of slime over the side where it slid down, slowly, leaving a trail like a slug to the paper mat beneath. Sure, the girl looked quiet _now,_ but Reg remembered the raving demon that spent her first two weeks in a padded room, shrieking in terror all through the dark hours of the night, and lashing out at everyone as if fighting for her life. A month wasn't long enough to forget. A year wouldn't be.

Filipa glared up at him, fire in her eyes. "Food, Reg. Move your ass." He backpedaled, shaking his head, and was out of the room and on his way to the kitchen before the nurse finished her whispered apology to Mary, our Lady of Saints.

Filipa turned back to her young charge, folding the delicate hands together and resting them on top of the thin blue blanket. Stroking them gently, she looked earnestly into the pale face. "Christine," she said. "Your name is Christine. Something bad happened to you; you were – in an accident, but you're safe now. Do you remember?" She chafed her hands gently, bringing faint blood to the surface of the cold flesh. The girl's sea-green eyes watched this, then rose to meet hers.

She shook her head. "No," she whispered. "I don't remember. I don't remember what happened." Her voice, already weak from disuse, trembled. Filipa winced to see tears welling. It was painful, she knew, to ask the girl to remember that night, the fire – but it was necessary. _If she's ever going to return to the world, she has to remember._ She leaned closer, clasping her fingers more tightly. "That's all right, belleza," she soothed. "That's all right. At least you're here with me. At least you're awake and here." _She answers to her name, at least. That's a step in the right direction._ For the first time since the electroshock therapy, she seemed fully awake and _present_, not lost in her dark fantasy endlessly pursued by monstrous dreams. _Even if she falls back into the darkness, she was here for a moment. She can come back._

---  
AMH  
2 May, 2006


	3. Chapter 3

**For In Every Dawn Sleeps Darkness  
**By Angelle M. Chandler

**Chapter 3**

**Before – Christine (Interlude I)**

He was always there. _Always._ There was never a time when I turned from the world's cruelty, eyes brimming, sobs hitching in my throat, that his arms did not enfold me in an embrace of warmth, understanding and, most of all, _love_. He had become my entire world, sheltering me from the derision of others, from the wicked, selfish attempts of some to thwart me in my stellar rise to greatness. Oh, yes – the twin monsters of jealousy and petty spite followed me, lashing out with poisonous tongues to strike me down again and again, but _he _was always there to pick me up again, to love me and make me believe in myself again. Tenderly wiping my tears, soothing me with the sweet balm of his music.

It was always the music. If I was born for music, then he was the maestro that gave me life. The music flowed through him like water, and he poured it out over my parched and thirsting soul until I was filled, overflowing – yet always yearning for more. And how I yearned – I didn't just want to hear the music, or sing it – I wanted to _be _the music, and nothing less would do. And he felt it too, saw inside me and knew that I had the unique capacity to let the music truly live, through my voice, my life, my very soul. He would teach me, he said, if I would promise to do more than merely practice – I must do exactly as he said, in everything, and obey him without question. The divine spirit of the music would not shed his glory upon just anyone – to become a true aficionado, I would have to devote myself to the music, body and mind, and put aside all other worldly cares and desires. My heart must never be divided. There would be only the music – and through it, in the only way he knew to express it to me – his love. Or there would be nothing.

It is unfair and misleading if I've characterized him as cold or uncaring. At times he may have seemed aloof, but I never for a moment doubted his devotion. The music was his first love, but the music lived within me, flowing between us, joining us, drawing us ever closer. His only desire was to see me succeed, and to this he devoted his entire existence. He coached me exactingly, demanding much, always knowing when I gave less than all that was within me. It was not enough for me to hit every note, to pronounce each phrase – even those in languages I did not speak -- with exquisite care (though he coached me in these as well). Technique was not enough, he told me often enough. Anyone could learn the physical act of singing 'correctly' – what he demanded was perfection in every sense, including that of emotion. _We do not listen to music simply to _hear_ it,_ he so often chided me when I was tired and cranky from hours of lessons. _We listen to music to _feel _it bringing us alive, warming us as the rest of the world cannot. _That_, Christine, is what I expect from you. Make the music live._

Great expectations. Too great, perhaps, with no room for the failure it would seem to invite. But it wasn't, not with him as teacher and guide. I strove with all I had to please him, my heart overflowing at the praise he gave when he felt I deserved it. But never _too _much praise – only enough to make me try harder next time. _Almost perfect, my dear Christine. So close. Perhaps next time…Shall we take it again?_

And we did, him encouraging me always to go one step beyond what I thought was the limit, to find more within myself, and me – his Christine – willing to do whatever it took to please him.

I never did.

When the policeman came to the classroom door, Mother Assumpta hovering behind him like a black-and-white-robed shadow, I knew before he spoke that something awful had happened. I felt it inside of me, in the deepest part where nothing but the music could ever reach. That place was empty now, cold and lifeless, and I began to shiver so much that the elderly Mother Superior hastened away to fetch me her own black knitted shawl. Black, of course, which was only proper for a young girl in mourning.

It seemed a nightmare with no blessed awakening when they came to me with the idiot tale of his death; how he had stopped at an ATM machine for cash on his way home from the university so that we could go together for ice cream at the tiny store on the corner, a 'mom and pop' operation so old-fashioned that they didn't even accept credit cards. That day was my birthday, and it was to be a surprise, an unexpected treat. A teenaged kid, later found to have been hopped up on a giddy cocktail of PCP and heroin, walked up to him and tapped him on the shoulder. He turned, and the kid pulled a handgun from the baggy pocket of his striped woolen hoodie and shot him in the throat, then ran off. He didn't even take the money. It fluttered to the ground over my father's body, then caught in the wind and was carried, wet with his blood, away.

It was four days after my birthday that they put my father into the ground. Mother Assumpta and all of the Sisters attended the funeral service, a long, drawn-out Latin affair made all the more horrible by hearing the words of my beloved _libera me _spoken in such a context. There was music, also; solemn, mournful, bereft of life or feeling. Afterwards, I stood at the graveside under the thin April sun, dry-eyed though those around me, friends and co-workers of my father, wept. There was no point in tears. He was gone, forever, and with him my only other happiness – the music.

I was eight years old.

_Farewell, Daddy. _

---

6 May, 2006  
AMC


	4. Chapter 4

**For In Every Dawn Sleeps Darkness**

By Angelle M. Chandler

**Chapter 4**

**Notes – Pt. 1**

From the files of Special Inspector Detective Thomas VanWycke, FBI  
Email from Raoul Chagny to Philip Chagny  
November 23, 2005

Of course I'm coming to Thanksgiving dinner! Do you honestly think I'd miss out on Emilie's stuffed mushrooms and pecan pie? Not once in twenty-two years; I think I was weaned on her cooking! Even when Father wasn't speaking to me, I still managed to sneak in for a handful of hors d'oeuvres. I don't know what Mother will do when Emilie finally retires – she certainly can't do her own cooking. Could you imagine? Father would finally make good on his threat to move onto the yacht and spend the rest of his years sailing, and then who would she have to take care of her? You?

Just kidding, bro. With you so near at hand, Mother would have nothing to worry about even if Father did run away to sea. (Though I can't imagine that, either – he couldn't survive even a month without fresh linens.) You could take over the family business full-time (which you're practically doing now, Mr. Lord High Chief of Marketing, All Hail the Chief!) and Father could finally stop worrying about what to do about _me._

Baaa, baaa. That's me, the Chagny Family black sheep, at your service. :bow: I wish Father would just accept facts – I'm not like him, and I'm never going to be. Mother says I get that Bohemian streak from her side of the family – you remember great-Aunt Cecily who ran away to join the circus when she was only 15? Mother never tells that story in front of Father – Old Money like Philip Elleridge Chagny III could never admit to having an acrobat in the family! That would certainly give his pride a black eye. But with you in the business and his heritage safely preserved, wouldn't you think he could relax that iron fist just a little bit on his younger and woefully less 'ambitious' son? Mother tries to understand, I think, but even she can't quite come to grips with having a poet in the family. A poet! Egads, and hide the sheep! To hear them go on about it, -- well, never mind. You've heard it all before, ad nauseum. As have I. Good Christ almighty, as have I.

So, on to something happier. You asked if I was bringing anyone to Thanksgiving dinner this year. As a matter of fact, I am! And much to Father's surprise (because, as you know, all poets must be gay), it's a GIRL, someone I met in my Modern Poets course. And brother, she made dragging myself to an eight o'clock class seem like paradise! Philip, she's an angel, an absolute dream. Most of the female poetry crowd on campus seems to consist of unshaved legs and faces like men, ugh! But Christine – she's everything I ever wanted, and then some. She's delicate, almost childlike, but grown up in all the right places, with this kind of innocent air about her as if she's from another world. Hair like the sun, and eyes like the sea about to storm. (Poet!) She's gentle and soft and I swear I can hear music when she speaks… Yes, I am smitten, Philip, smitten! I can't imagine what she sees in me – other than the legendary Chagny charm, the chiseled chin, the deep blue eyes, the dark wavy hair, and of course my modesty and humility. ;)

She's a Vocal Music major, but she's taking poetry classes for her electives because it helps her find 'the meaning behind the music'. As beautiful as she is, it's a quiet kind of beauty, the kind you don't notice until you're looking right at it. She seems to blend into the crowd, hiding herself, but when she speaks – it's as if your ears had never heard anyone speak until that moment.

The first time I heard her speak, she was crying. I know, weird, huh? We were discussing Michael Anderson's "Please, Dad", and Professor Adams was calling out people to read and then interpret – you know the drill; it was mostly to see if we were awake or asleep. "Daae', next stanza," he said, and it only drew my attention because there was a long pause like whoever it was didn't know where we were, and everyone turned to see who hadn't been paying attention. Then, "I'm sorry," a tremulous voice said, so soft I could barely hear her from the back of the lecture hall. "I can't --" She took a deep breath and then just started reading:

_Please, Dad, today just hear my call,  
I'm sorry that I dropped the ball.  
My life is wrecked, my knees are skinned,  
My emotions undisciplined.  
I can't get up although I try,  
Please don't be upset if I cry.  
Though I can't fight what I can't see,  
Please, Dad, say you're still proud of me. _

She kept weeping throughout the whole thing, but she didn't stop reading until she reached the end. I think I was half in love with her already. You know me, Philip – always ready to rush to the rescue. And if ever anyone needed rescuing, she did; I just wanted to take her in my arms, wipe away her tears, and tell her no one and nothing would ever hurt her again. Yeah, I know. You always said if I was President, I'd bring about world peace by giving everyone a puppy. :p

But I'm giving you the wrong impression of my Christine; I don't want you to think she cries all the time! She's not some kind of whack-job suicidal nut-job or a sob-sister who should be in therapy. That's more my line anyhow, damn moody bastard of a poet that I am (and yet another way in which I've Let Father Down(tm), as he never fails to remind me at every opportunity). Christine is the Sun to my Moon, the light that shines in places I'd long surrendered to darkness and thought would never feel warmth again. She's the best part of my heart, and I don't think I could go on without her. I know that sounds nuts, since I've only known her for a few weeks, but it seems like we've known each other forever.

That's why I'm going to ask her to marry me. Tomorrow, at dinner. Mother will cry and Father will thunder as he always does, but I'm going to do it, and ask for Father's damned family patriarchal blessing. She's a part of me, as surely as if we'd spent our entire lives getting to know each other rather than three weeks. I don't expect you to understand that – but I hope you'll keep an open mind and take my side when the inevitable shit hits the proverbial fan, in the middle of Emilie's inestimable turkey and trimmings, and drink a toast to my fiancée (always assuming that she says yes! Cross your fingers for me, Oh Elder and Wiser and Ever More Reliable Chagny son).

Take care, bro. Remember, Hans Margolius said, "One man all by himself is nothing. Two people who belong together make a world."

Always your little brother –

Raoul

----

Fragment – page found torn from diary of Christine Daae'  
Date unknown

I can't. I just _can't._ He wants me to love him, to give over all of myself and what makes me who I am, without a thought. To just be his, under his control. I won't let anyone else live my life for me, ever again! _You are not my father._ Even when I'm alone, sometimes I think I can hear – _(fragment ends)_

(Comment – S.I. VanWycke: Who is _'he'_..? The Chagny boy? Or the other?)

----

Item: A color photograph, taken against the background of the School of Music and Modern Dance. Three students, female, with arms about each other's shoulders and strongly lit by the sun, regard the camera. Figure one: Tall, fiery red hair piled loosely on her head, smooth olive skin, giving a haughty fashion-model's smile. Figure two: Slender, blonde and fair, glancing up almost shyly with a faint blush. Figure three: Slighter than the other two, with a riot of dark curls and deep black eyes. The photo clearly demonstrates their bond; they are flaunting a close and probably unbreakable friendship. In deep purple ink on the back of the photo, in a flowing hand that matches that in the Daae' diary, is the notation "Carlotta, me, Meg – June 2005".

----

Fragment – page found torn from diary of Christine Daae'  
Date unknown

The dreams again, and that _voice._ Always calling, even in the darkest hours of the night. _Will he never let me be?_

----

AMC

29 May, 2006

Your reviews are, as always, most welcome! Thank you for reading. :)


	5. Chapter 5

**For In Every Dawn Sleeps Darkness**

By Angelle M. Chandler

**Chapter 5**

Excerpt from The Opera Burned by Megan Giry  
Random House, 2006  
(Reprinted with permission)

Why did it happen? That's what they always ask, as if I have some kind of special knowledge because I was her friend. Why didn't she tell anyone what was happening, and, even more important, _how is it that no one knew?_

None of us saw it coming. No one. We had no idea what she was going through, how much trouble Christine was in. Not me, not Raoul (who hardly left her side before his brother's death) – not even Carlotta, and she was at least as close to Carlotta as she was to me.

In the beginning it was the three of us, just us girls. I started out at the University; this is my hometown. I'll probably always live here. I used to want to move to New York, to make it big and dance on Broadway, but not anymore. Peace and quiet is all I want now, and a chance to try to forget the horrific events of the night the opera burned. But I can't forget. Every time I close my eyes I see her, up on the rooftop, her hair floating in the raging wind from the rising flames like a halo. As if she really was an angel. I see her turn, her eyes wide with terror and her hands rising in self-defense – and again I see her fall. Peace and quiet and forgetfulness; is that so much to ask?

See? Even when I'm talking about how it began, the ending is always there, a nightmare loop inexorably drawing us all in. But we didn't know. How could we? All we had were three girls who came together at a time in our lives when we needed to form close bonds with others like ourselves, and we found each other. Christine and Carlotta arrived at the University on the same day, almost within the same hour. Christine transferred from out of state; Carlotta was an exchange student from the Lisbon Music Conservatory in Portugal. The similarity ended there, though. Where Carlotta Cruz-Flores was tall and dark, strong and sleek, Christine Daae' was willowy and fragile, pale and delicate as fine china. Like china, too, she could be brittle and cold when the mood took her. When that happened, it was best to just let her alone.

On the day before classes began, an hour before the final deadline for department registration, they both appeared in the offices of the School of Music requesting dispensation to begin second-year activities. Both were unwilling to submit to the usual semester-long probationary period required before taking active part in student programs – in this instance, the recitals, reviews and actual full-length operas put on by the Vocal Music Department.

Both were granted private auditions with Professor Dubaise, Head of the Department – against University policy. Both auditioned specifically for the Opera program – against all odds with the same aria from Butterfly – and both were granted the requested dispensation. Again, against University policy.

It was unheard of for an unknown student to come in to the Vocal Music program and, untried, be given leave to take part in the extremely well-regarded Glassman Opera Society, one of the largest music programs in the country and certainly the biggest fund-raiser for the department -- if not the entire university. Application to the program was advised at a minimum of two years' advance notice. Students waited months for an audition with an Under-Professor. For Dubaise herself to hear not one but both of them – and to welcome _both _of them to the most prestigious Vocal Music program in the district – well, it simply wasn't done. But it was. Carlotta Cruz-Flores and Christine Daae', who should have been at each other's throats in jealous competition for the coveted chance, instead clasped nervously trembling hands and wished each other well. Someone was watching out for them that cloudy September afternoon, and they got what they wanted. The two Sophomores, as different from each other as night to day, were in.

And where do I come into the unlikely story of the two sopranos on whom Dame Fortune smiled? Professor Dubaise is my Stepmother. I used to laugh that she'd never forgiven me for majoring in Modern Dance rather than music, but I guess it's all in the blood. My father was a dancer – ballet, if you can believe it. He was good. But they divorced, saying he didn't like being tied down to a wife and kid, and he went back to France where they'd lived happily before I came along. He drowned two months later passed out in a swimming pool in his hotel. I hope he enjoyed those last two months.

With Dubaise for a mother and a Dance major, it was a natural for me to hang around the School of Music. I was in the small practice hall, the one with two barres, working through a particularly sticky bit of arabesque when Carlotta poked her head in looking for directions. Christine followed, asking for the same. I sent them both upstairs to the Department Secretary, so I guess in a roundabout way it was me that started the whole thing. I wish often that I'd just kept my mouth shut. Maybe then they would have remained lost, missed the registration deadline, not gotten the audition – and maybe none of it would have happened. Was it my fault? Of course not. But if there has to be a fault, it may as well be mine. It makes as much sense as the rest of it – meaning none.

Half an hour later I heard them return, a clatter of feet dancing down the wide, curving staircase from Dubaise's office. They burst into the room, one laughing and triumphant, the other washed out, tired-looking as if she'd been stretched on a rack instead of singing a triumphant audition, yet oddly exhilarated at the same time. There was a pale fire in her eyes that gave her an ethereal look that contrasted starkly with the other girl's earthy joy – but both were clearly beyond themselves with what their success. I looked from one to the other as their tale bubbled out of them – mostly out of the one called Carlotta – and felt a weird feeling of deja-vu. We talked, me putting aside my practice shoes and gathering my belongings for the walk home, them telling me and each other all the things you tell new acquaintances when meeting for the first time – and yet it seemed we knew it all already. By the time we got out of the building, we were friends. By the time we reached the far parking lot where the university property ends, we were good friends. And by the time I dragged them home with me to the loft apartment I shared with absolutely nobody as my last roommate had been expelled last term for smoking dope and 'indecency', we were well on the way to becoming the best of friends.

I wish with all my heart we'd never met.

---

AMC  
29 May, 2006

Please read and review if you wish! Angelles love reviews!


	6. Chapter 6

**For In Every Dawn Sleeps Darkness – Chapter 6**

**Carlotta – A Diva Speaks (Part I)**

Christine was a mystery. To me, and probably to everyone who knew her. Even her closest friends were more often than not left carefully walking the narrow line she drew around her most personal self. It wasn't that she didn't let one in. Rather, she seemed to hold herself too much inside, leaving one with the feeling of peering into a loosely-curtained window, constantly hoping for a glimpse between cupped hands through the narrow gaps in the velvety fabric. Yes, Christine was like that – one had to become almost a 'Peeping Tom' to really know her, and everything about her made one forbear to intrude on her privacy to that degree. We took what she consented to give us, and were grateful.

Meg, Christine, and I – inseparable, devoted, and unstoppable. We turned the Music Department on its ear. Meg, lithe and quick, the Director's daughter: all the young men wanted her (and not so young, too), and she could not have cared less. Their fawning and fluttering incited not the tiniest bit of interest in raven-haired Meg. Her father was example enough to her that men were untrustworthy, and she was not about to make her mother's mistake and end up saddled with an unwanted (though now much-loved) child before she had had her chance to live.

As for me, I was – the opposite. In Lisbon, where I began university, things were much more free and in the open than they are here, and I was not inclined to hypocritically deny the heat of my blood for a pretense of virtue simply for the reason of a change in geography. To the locals I was an exotic: fiery, temperamental, and completely the opposite of the cold American girls who chattered and preened themselves before them in an endless immature parade. They fell at my feet as I doled a word to one, a glance to another, like honey from the richest and most humid of blooms. They drank me in, and if I rewarded their attentions with something of over-generosity, in my defense I can only shrug and smile. It was my indulgence, and I am unashamed.

Here again, the enigma of Christine remains. She never sought the attention of men, though she did not make them exactly _unwelcome_, either. When we began at the Glassman together, boys were one of the first topics that the three of us discussed – ravenously, like starving wolves, long into the night. Christine made no mention of a love left behind when she came to California and, for a girl of our age, was oddly unashamed of the fact. No lovers? Not a single paramour to long for, whose touch to miss in the night? It was unthinkable. Yet the air of romance, of some tragedy past or yet to come, was at times so thick around her that it seemed close enough to touch. With a smile and a wave of her hand, she brushed it aside. "You love them for me, Carly," she would say. "My heart has room for only one master." She meant the music, of course – or The Music, as you could tell she thought of it, as if it were a sentient thing capable of anger of jealousy.

Can music be jealous of a man? Christine certainly thought so. For the first five months the three of us ran merrily amok in the Music Department, she successfully evaded the snares and arrows of that devil Cupid. Even later, there was only ever one young man to capture Christine's eye, and oh! How she tried to resist him. As one who had never fallen, though, she was fruit ripe for the plucking, and he had very nimble fingers. Within weeks, she spoke only of him.

Raoul, Raoul, Raoul! A dark and brooding Bohemian of good family and better-than-average looks, he had a fair chance at happiness with our little shining star.

She had none.

Poor, unhappy Christine! If only she had loosened her hold, sharing her secrets with those who loved her! We watched her go from sparkling to silent, from sunlight to shadow, and did nothing, respecting her silence and looking away. We should have pressed her, unrelenting, demanding the truth from those once-rosy lips gone so pale and bloodless. Fear and dread wove twin shrouds around her delicate shoulders, _yet we did nothing. _Nothing.

Could we have saved her? I still don't know. But we could have saved the boy. Nightly, this refrain robs me of sleep. Christine may have been already lost, but _we could have saved the boy. _Is God truly heartless and unforgiving that He would damn us for our inaction, our inability to see? Again, I do not know. So I have another glass of wine, and try to forget. _His haunted eyes, when he knew he'd lost her forever. His tears, and his haunted eyes._

---

AMC  
24 January, 2007

---

As always, thank you for reading, and for your patience in continuing this story. It's exciting to be back in (this version) of Christine's world. Reviews, positive, negative or neutral (or otherwise) are always very welcome.

This story will not suit some palates, as it is rather different than the 'usual', if such a thing can be said to exist in Phantom fanfics. ;)

Thanks again for reading.

Angelle


	7. Chapter 7

**For In Every Dawn Sleeps Darkness – Chapter 7  
****Interlude – A Voice in the Darkness (I)  
**

_True greatness is within your grasp, child. But first you must surrender. Surrender your will; surrender your spirit; surrender your time, your freedom. Surrender all that you have – no, not to _me_, child. To your one true master, the music._

The slight figure tossed restlessly on the stark institutional bed, legs quivering beneath the thin cotton sheet as though she dreamed of running. Filipa clucked her tongue as she glanced into the dim room, and moved briskly on silent feet to the bedside. The dark-haired young nurse pressed her lips together as she smoothed the errant sheet back into place over her slumbering charge. She passed a hand over Christine's smooth forehead – it was cool, not hot – and turned to draw a soft woolen blanket down from the top shelf of the linen closet adjoining the small private bathroom. Stretching onto her toes, she could just reach the plain rose-colored blanket. She could have asked one of the orderlies – Reg, for instance; she'd seen him hanging around down the hall talking trash with some of the other 'muscle' – but she valued her quiet time with this particular patient and didn't much want to share.

Christine didn't move as Filipa shook out the blanket and settled it warmly over her, tucking in the sides, and making sure that the cold metal buckles of the wrist restraints did not snag the wool. Filipa sighed and stood, one hand resting on the low side-rail of the adjustable bed, watching her sleep. _Must be dreaming,_ she thought. _Muchacha pobre, I don't know if that's a blessing or a curse. Some dreams are poison._

Christine's lips moved without sound. Her slender fingers drew into her palms, the knuckles whitening. Filipa hesitated, one hand hovering above the blond head, on the verge of waking her, but Christine's distress faded as she dropped back into deeper slumber. _Well, that's that. Can't watch over you all the time. Sleep well, muchacha._ She checked her watch and passed her lips briefly over Christine's pale brow, then crossed to the foot of the bed, noting down the girl's status and the time of her visit. '9:22 PM. Sleeping and at peace.' _I wish I could believe that._ Her crepe-soled shoes shushed faintly on the grey tile as she left the room.

----

The voice was so low that Christine could barely hear it. Meg, draped inelegantly over the high barre on the mirrored wall, stretched obscenely far before dropping her leg back down and bending to scoop up her dance team sweatshirt. Christine's hand, arrested mid-stroke as she drew a brush through her honey-colored hair, hovered a moment. She dropped the brush and glanced up, startling Meg and cutting Carlotta off mid-sentence in the midst of a long-winded description of her latest beau. Two pairs of wide eyes turned to hers. Carlotta spoke first.

"Christine, you look a goose just walked over your grave. What is it?" She cocked a hip, raising her chin. "Was my story that bad? I rather hoped I was being witty." Christine opened her lips to speak, but nothing came out.

"Seriously, are you OK?" Meg's dark blue eyes rounded in concern. "You do look –" She stopped, unsure. "Well, you don't look good." Carlotta grimaced beside her. "I mean –" A glare at the redhead, then a forced cheery smile to Christine. "Look, we're going to lunch, right? It's hot dog day at Maria Dining Hall." Meg drew Carlotta towards the door of the dressing room, turning expectantly to Christine.

She hadn't moved, but still stood in front of the bank of mirrors, hand floating in place as if it still held the brush. Christine's eyes went to her empty hand, then belatedly to the brush lying on the countertop, and at last back to her two friends waiting in the doorway.

"Oh!" She dropped her hand, cheeks paling then staining faintly with blood. "No, I'm – I'm fine. I just –" _Just what? Saw a ghost? Am hearing voices? No. _She shook her head, blonde waves concealing her face as she glanced at her feet. "I want to work on my audition piece a little longer. I'm not really very hungry right now after all," she trailed off lamely. She stooped and picked up the folio from the floor, ignoring the looks Meg and Carlotta exchanged. She knew it well – "Christine's in one of her moods; just let it go," – so she was only slightly surprised that they didn't put up an argument. In the three months they'd known each other, they'd learned to let her alone when one of her darker moods took her, letting her work things out on her own.

Meg raised her delicate eyebrows, then gave a nod and swept the outer door open. A sweet, mild wind carried in the delicate scent of crab-apple blooms. Holding the door for Carlotta, Meg called back, "Come on, let's eat already! We'll catch you later, Christine." Carlotta gave her a dubious glance. "Don't work _too_ hard." Her eyes went to the folio clutched in Christine's white hands. "It's only an audition, and we're both going to end up in the chorus anyhow." She touched the pins holding that amazingly rich red hair in place. "If we get in at all. Let's just be glad to audition, hmm?"

"Carlotta, come _on_!"

She sighed and spun on her heel, pulling her purse up over one shoulder. She studied Christine's face but, finding nothing, gave her a half smile and followed Meg out into the hazy afternoon.

Christine remained in place after they had gone, listening. The door clunked into place, muting the cheerful din of students passing outside. She waited, unmoving. The quiet in the rehearsal hall grew enormous in her straining ears. She tuned out the steady, low tick-tick-tick of the wall clock, and the soft hum of the ventilation fans. _I imagined it. _Her eyes searched the long run of mirrors down the room's east wall. The fleeting image she'd seen (_thought I saw)_ did not reappear. All was quiet and deserted and at peace. She held her breath for a count of twenty. Nothing happened. No shadowy figure beckoned from within the dark mirrors. No voice, strangely melodious and deep, spoke, its tone pitched for her ears only. She was alone.

_There was nothing there, Christine,_ she chided herself, turning with a small shudder from her wide-eyed reflection. _Now you're going to miss lunch, and Meg and Carly think you're a goose._ _"A goose walked over your grave",_ Meg's voice whispered in her memory, making her wince. "There was nothing there," she asserted aloud, starting at the harsh echo bouncing from the high ceiling. She turned deliberately and picked up her backpack, shoulders tight as she crossed to the door. By the time her hands closed over the cool metal of the door handle, pressing it down with a metallic clang, she had almost convinced herself that nothing unusual had happened. There had been no one, no one at all. No tall figure, the face hidden, beckoning. And absolutely no voice, touching her heart like a cold, velvety finger stroking her soul: _If you want glory, Christine, it can be yours. I am with you, always._

---

AMC  
24 January, 2007

---  
As always, thank you for reading. Review, if you are so inclined. :)


	8. Chapter 8

**For In Every Dawn Sleeps Darkness  
**By Angelle M. Chandler

**Chapter 8**

**Notes – Part II**

Palo Alto Medical Center  
Notice of Transfer  
Patient Name: Christine Daae'  
Sex: Female  
Date of Birth: September 11, 1990  
Next of Kin: Unknown  
Physician: Dr. Regina Kim

Admitting Diagnosis: Trauma-induced catatonia (handwritten notation: "Fire; smoke inhalation; possible suicidal ideation. Jumper?")  
Reason for Transfer: Increased suicidal ideation and aggressive/violent behavior (self)

Physician's Notes: (handwritten) Pt. recovered from catatonic state one week ago. Spoke lucidly. Marked memory loss, 'blank spots'. Pt. well-oriented to surroundings, nourished self of own accord. Calm demeanor, except when probed for details surrounding "Glassman incident". This morning when asked, could not provide name or address of any living person to take charge of her if released (as seemed likely). Pt. became uncomfortable, nervous – topic dropped. Left pt. in her room unattended for an hour before bedtime (pt. prefers not to attend common room). Staff alerted by alarm in pt.'s room. Shards of broken glass everywhere. Pt. had smashed all mirrors, both in her room and adjoining lavatory. Weapon used was bare hands. Pt. sustained minor lacerations to the soft tissues of both hands, one of which required sutures. Pt. appeared calm at discovery, though weeping. Held out hands for assistance, and willingly surrendered herself. Pt. received 3 mg Haloperidol for sedation, had hand sutured, and was returned to bed awaiting psychological assessment. Soft restraints.

Next page

Physician Recommendation: Pt. is to be transferred to the 8th floor (locked ward – violent and dangerous). Isolation; restraints at all times. _No reflective surfaces_!! Though sedated with Haloperidol, pt. experienced recurrence of mania and 'fight or flight' behavior triggered by an orderly's withdrawing the window curtains this P.M., showing pt's reflection in the window glass. Pt. dosage raised to 5 mg. Haloperidol t.i.d., or as needed.

Transfer effected 3:14 A.M. January 14, 2007  
Physician Initials: RGK.

----

"Well, Filipa. Lost your little songbird, huh?" Reg propped the long-handled mop against the cleaning cart and leaned against it, the handle bowing slightly with his weight. The petite nurse shot him a look that by all rights should have crisped the hair from his arms, and then returned to stripping the empty bed. The bottom sheet bore dark maroon spots that could only have been blood. Filipa balled up the thin cotton, hiding them, and stuffed the whole mess roughly into the small hamper at her side.

"Go back to work." Her voice was low, uncharacteristically devoid of the usual bantering humor that marked her friendship with the orderly. "Isn't it time for you to go home?" She grabbed the pillow and began ripping the case from it, turning her back to the doorway, but not quickly enough to hide the tear that snaked down her cheek. She brushed it brusquely away.

"Aw, Filipa. Hey, I'm sorry." Reg leaned the mop more securely against the wall and came into the dim room. Filipa didn't turn, even when he was right behind her, one large hand timidly patting at the white shoulder of her starched uniform. "I'm sorry," he repeated. Filipa stiffened. He was about to pull away, embarrassed, when the little nurse spun around and crumpled against him, sobbing into his chest. Awkwardly, he raised his arms to wrap around her, patting at first, then simply holding her as she wept.

"_Damn_ it, Reg." Filipa's words were muffled by the front of Reg's shirt, and her continuing tears. Reg leaned his head down a bit to hear her better. "Damn it all. Just – just _damn it_!" One of Filipa's strong little fists pounded Reg in the ribs. He grunted, but wisely chose to let her get it out of her system. She sobbed harder. Reg patted again at her shoulders. _You be ruinin' my new white shirt, Filipa-baby, but hell if I gonna say anythin' 'bout it now. Think I'm batshit crazy?_ He waited for her to taper off, and for the inevitable 'Madre mia' asking forgiveness from Mary for the profanity, when Filipa let loose a string of Spanish invectives that made him blush – and he didn't even _speak_ Spanish. Finally, nearly choking on her tears, she shoved herself roughly away from him and crossed the room to the window, scrubbing both hands over her wet, red eyes. Reg watched her, and was about to speak when a nasal voice intruded.

"Everything all right in here? Filipa?" Ascott, the head nurse on the floor, poked her narrow nose in the door. "She _fine_," Reg responded and reached to pull the door closed. Ascott's hand stopped it, her gaze moving from Filipa to Reg and back again, unconvinced. "Filipa? You sure?" The younger nurse nodded and snuffled something like an affirmative. "She just need a minute. Christ, can't anybody even talk aroun' here without getting the third degree? 'Scuse us. Please." Ascott reluctantly removed her arm, and Reg shut the door in her face. Comically surprised, her eyes gaped in through the narrow window and then she moved on down the hallway.

For a long moment there was quiet, only broken by the soft sounds of Filipa wiping her face and taking slowly-decreasing breaths. "If you'd rather be alone…" Reg half turned to go. "No. Wait." Filipa faced him, the fire in her eyes beginning to fade back to their normal kind mocha. Reg stood, his arms dangling at his sides, head cocked to one side. "I'm sorry about your shirt, Reg. You must let me have it cleaned." He blinked at her in disbelief. "All that garbage comin' out your mouth, and you worried about my _shirt_?" He snorted. "Shouldn't you be saying ten 'hail Marys' or somethin'?"

Filipa shook her head. "That's only if you've done something wrong. And I meant every word of that." She frowned again, hands clenching, and Reg feared a repeat performance, but she pulled herself back together. "They had _no right,_ Reg. None! She was doing so much better, she was awake, she was aware, and they – they just barge in here asking questions no one should ask of her!" She turned back to the window, seeing something other than the early-morning sunrise. Reg waited while she paced up and down the length of the room, staring out through the glass. "How could they be so stupid?" She raised her hands, fingers spread wide. "That child was an orphan – all they had to do was check her school records to find that out. She had no one – no one!" She turned back, crisp white skirt swishing against white-stockinged legs, and crossed back. "And then to ask her who she had in the world! Who she had! Madre mia, how could they be so cruel?"

She seemed to be waiting for an answer. Reg raised his shoulders. "I don't see what's so 'cruel' about it, Filipa," he began reasonably; "Everybody got _somebody_, don't they?" Filipa strode forward, one finger jabbing Reg in the chest. "All that little girl had in the world was the de Chagny boy, Reg! That's all!" Reg fell back in surprise, shaking his head in confusion. Filipa clutched her forehead. "The de Chagny boy, the de Chagny boy!" she repeated, her voice rising. "The one that burned to death in the fire!" Reg's eyes widened. Filipa's eyes went again to the window. "Small wonder she can't bear the reflection. She's completely alone."

Filipa seemed to shrink slightly as she wound down at last. Reg shook his head mutely; he'd forgotten about the only fatality of the tragedy that had brought Christine into their care. Likely the doctors had forgotten, too, as awful as that possibility was. "Filipa," he ventured, "Probably it was just a mistake, that's all, and – "

"A mistake," she repeated dully, sinking onto the edge of the accusingly bare mattress. "A mistake they made, and now my poor belleza is up on the 8th floor, with no one to look after her, to make her eat her breakfast and say her name…" She heaved a deep, shuddering sigh, only now seeming to realize that her hands were clenched into tight fists. She opened them, flexing the fingers to work the tight muscles. Filipa's sorrowful eyes rose to Reg's face. "I really am sorry about your shirt," she said again. "If you give it to me, I'll iron it for you. It's the least I can do." He shook his head. "Nah, Filipa-baby. I gonna keep it just the way it is, as a souvenir. I always knew you need me around for somethin'." His cheery tone was only a little bit forced. She returned a grateful half smile as she stood and walked towards the door. "You do that, Reg. Maybe someday I'll do something for you." She leaned on the bar to push the heavy door into the hallway. Ascott's surprised bird-face floated in the opening before Filipa pushed past her. "Filipa, are you leaving the floor?" Filipa never paused. "Smoke break." She reached the end of the hall and punched the button for the elevator. Alcott frowned. "But you don't smoke!" "I know that," Filipa called back. The door slid open with a 'ding!' and Filipa stepped inside. "Then where are you going," Ascott fumed. Filipa stuffed a key from the ring at her belt into the lockbox on the elevator wall and the door began to slide shut. "Eighth floor," she called out before they shut with a firm metallic sound. "I'm going to visit my belleza."

---

Through eyes blurred with tears, she watched the thin figure in the tiny room. Her view was cross-hatched with chicken-wire diamonds – of course, the window was safety glass, for the same reason that the walls and floor were padded with soft rubber. This was isolation, where the most violent and disturbed patients spent their days securely wrapped in canvas straitjackets, shrieking and bouncing off the walls. Her poor Christine surely didn't belong here! Not shrieking, not throwing herself against the impassive walls, the girl simply knelt on the dingy white floor, rocking herself back and forth. Her eyes were closed, her lips moving in a constant litany too soft to carry through the door. Filipa turned away, closing her eyes tightly as tears rose within them again.

_Raoul. _

_Raoul, I'm sorry. _

_Raoul, I'm so sorry. _

_Forgive me. _

_Please forgive me. _

_Raoul, please forgive me if you can._

_If you can._

_Raoul._

_Raoul, I'm sorry._

_I'm so sorry._

_Raoul,_

_I loved you, Raoul._

_I never meant for this to happen._

_I never meant for this._

_I never meant it._

_I never meant it, Raoul._

_I never meant it, Raoul._

_Forgive me._

------

AMC  
27 January, 2007

------

Thank you again for reading. Please leave a review if you like -- as always, I'm very interested to see what people think of this very untraditional telling of the story of Christine and her Phantom. It's meant to be different, and to push the envelope, challenging many people's views of the tragic story. I hope those that have made it this far are enjoying the journey, and the gentle unfolding of the tale. Cheers!


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